Protestors blockade Jaffna Kachcheri

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 April 2000, 13:18 GMT]Hundreds of people blocked the entrance of the Jaffna Kachcheri from this morning demanding that the civilians in the war zone in Jaffna's southern sector be allowed by the Sri Lanka Army to move out of their villages forthwith to safer areas in other parts of the peninsula. An urgent note to the Sri Lanka army's 52-2 brigade in Kodikamam was sent by the Government Agent for Jaffna following the blockade urging the officers there to do the needful for the civilians' release. There was no reply to his note until 5 p.m. today, Kachcheri officials said. The blockade of the Jaffna District Secretariat continues.

The protest blockade of the Jaffna Kachcheri was organised today by the Jaffna University Students' Union and an alliance of forty NGOs. The organisers of the Kachcheri blockade said that it will continue until a solution is found to the problem of more than five thousand civilians who are trapped in their villages between Pallai and the Elephant Pass garrison from March 27, in the midst of heavy fighting.

The SLA's Civil Co-ordinating Officer Brigadier Tilekaratna spoke to the university students during the day, persuading them to give up the blockade. His appeal was rejected.

The Jaffna University Students' Union, meanwhile, called on students at all Jaffna schools and private institutions to join the protest blockade tomorrow.